City Defense

Author

File Description

jocamar

Posted on 12/26/08 @ 02:43 PM

File Details

Version:

Empires: Retail Release

Hi, this is the first time I post a scenario here. I had lots of them but I hat to clean my computer and as I thought Empires Heaven was closed I deleted them.
Fortunately its open again wich will encourage me to make more scenarios.

So this scenario depicts a fictional battle in a Portuguese city.
The player commands the british captains which command the army AI. The troops follow the captain they are assigned to and each captain can buy more troops in the city center (by selecting the captain and typing "buy" in the chat box. You are able to choose your starting battalions but you can buy any troops you want later.

You buy troops with gold and gold is gained trough killing enemies. The enemies come in waves from three sides you must hold three positions marked by British flags. As soon as the enemy captures one position the flag turn to a French one. If the enemy controls the three flags (not counting the center) you have 30 seconds to retake at least one flag.

To assist you in battle you will periodically receive reinforcements trough a pop up. You are able to choose which reinforcements you receive and they will arrive in the center square.

You must protect your captains because they are very strong and can kill any units with one shot.
To protect them you can use cover, found in several trenches and barricades in the city easily recognizable. Cover heals your troops and provides an attack bonus.

Just so it is clear, you cannot win in this scenario. You can just hope to hold for as long as possible and try to beat your own records.

I also have a multilayer version which ill post later. Hope you like the map ^^

This scenario is a very good example of a "defend your position to the last man" battle. The ability to choose the type of your reinforcements was definitely one of the more fun aspects of the game, and the cover system was a cool novelty, though I found it extremely difficult to make my men actually move to hide behind objects.

However, I did feel it was slightly more difficult to counter sharpshooters than I think it should have been, but that might have something to do with my sub-par micromanagement skills. Also, although the idea of only controlling officers is unique, I did not find it as fun as I thought I would because I really couldn't access some of the special abilities of my starting units. Perhaps it would be more fun if you had direct control over half of you soldiers and the other half were Portuguese soldiers fighting under the command of British officers.

Balance: 3.4
Over all, this scenario has a decent difficulty level, and it is helpful to have full visibility and warnings about incoming attacks. However, as previously stated, I think that the French shouldn't have sharpshooters, or at least have less - in the thick of battle, my entire southern force was wiped out by a sharpshooter while I tried to defend the north from an attack.

Creativity: 4.2
Although there have been some Napoleonic wars scenarios done before, the combination of the officers' control mechanism and the cover system add an unexpected RPG element to what would otherwise have been an unremarkable "hold the fort" mission, which I thought was really cool. Nice work!

Map Design: 4.5
The city looks very realistic, and the extra details, such as carts and barrels and crates, show that a lot of effort was put into map design. The river and especially the bridge looked very realistic and impressive, as did the French camps. The ability to see the whole map helped showcase the good work on the forests, also. Very impressive.

Story/Instructions: 3.4
The instructions were pretty easy to understand and well written (although there were a few spelling errors - but hey, no one's perfect!), but there was a lot of information to digest. The backstory of the French invasion of Portugal was sufficient to set up the scenario, but since there really isn't much of a plot and only a little characterization, I can only give you a 3.4 here. Nevertheless, as I said before, the instructions where both well written and helpful, and the ability to chat for help was also very useful.

Additional Comments:
Map design, as I said before, was very well done. Also, I was somewhat confused as to why there was a flag pole telling me about upcoming attacks, so I think it would be helpful if you changed speakers.

Over all, a very well done scenario that is definitely worth a download. Well done!